For Dreams We Live
by ImpossiblyReal
Summary: It's Zoro's dream to be the best swordsman. And to do that, he needs to move up the rankings in the underground fighting world as much as he possibly can. He's finally got an offer to join a high ranking team... But he's not the only one who does. ZoSan (Eventually)! I'm going to rate it T for now, but I have no idea if it might need an M rating eventually or not, honestly.
1. Chapter 1

This was it. The day Zoro had been training and competing the last two years for; he had a meeting with one of the leaders of an underground fight club. Not just any underground fight club, but _the_ underground fight club. The organization called themselves The New World, claiming they had brought about a whole new level and style of underground fighting to America. There were a lot of different teams you could join that fell under the name of New World organizations, but Zoro had never been invited in to any until now. He figured he really owed it to Luffy for getting him a place on the team. It was currently run by a red haired man named Shanks- or maybe not named Shanks, but that was what he called himself. Luffy fought for him, and Shanks seemed to almost step into the father role in Luffy's life, leaving the two equally dedicated to each other. Zoro had met him once before when the offer was extended after his most recent fight last week, where some of the New World leaders had come to check out the upcoming fighters. Rumor had it that a couple of the teams were looking for some spots to be filled. Sure, Zoro could have easily kept climbing the rankings outside of New World's radar, but he needed to be affiliated with the name in order to attract the attention of a certain swordsman who was on the most elite team underground fighting had ever seen; they were known as the Warlords. They consisted of about seven people, but Zoro was only interested in one; Hawk. Hawk currently had the title of the best swordsman in the _world_ , and as far as Zoro was concerned, that was a title he was going to take. But he had to be in the same system as Hawk to even get a fight, or he would be brushed off and the challenge never accepted officially. And now he was going to be.

He had woken up early that morning, barely able to sleep in his excitement. Running a hand through his short green hair, he decided not to dress to impress that much, but stick to a more casual appearacne. Dressing up was for the higher-ups in New World; your style of dress represented your status. So, not wanting to overstep and associate himself with Shank's level of power, he chose dark jeans and a plain black t-shirt. Not able to wait another second, and thinking it would be better not to be late anyway, he decided to leave ten minutes early. He grabbed the keys to his bike and practically ran out the door to his driveway. The drive there wasn't long at all. The meeting was going to take place at the arena itself. Zoro had only been to the first floor, where the entrance and lounge area was, and the basement, where the fight ring and spectator seating was. But he knew there was a second and third floor where more official business was held. And today, Zoro was going to the second floor. Arriving perfectly on time- how did he go from being early to being just on time? Oh well- he parked his bike and headed in. The building was so familiar that it eased his nerves a bit. He wasn't _scared_ , just nervous because social things were not his greatest strength. He could cut a man down in seconds, but he couldn't always present himself smoothly when he had to talk. The plain fronted brick building and shabby doors made it completely inconspicuous to any who didn't know about the underground organizations who gathered here for fighting. And both the elevator and door to the stairs required a key card to open, so only members could get anywhere other than the lounge area. So, to anyone who did stumble upon it, it was just a room with tons of seating, a bar, and interesting lighting. Pushing the front doors open and heading across the floor to the back where the stairs were, Zoro held his card up to the door, and the light next to it turned from red to green. Grinning, he walked through the doors, and for the first time in his life he went up the stairs, instead of down. He wasn't an expert on metaphors, but this felt like a good one to him.

Reaching the door to the second floor, he found that too needed a card key to access it. Praying his would work, he held it against the scanner. Hearing the accepting click of the lock retreating, Zoro's heart jumped and the reality of his situation sank in. He had a place in New World.

He looked around and took in the setting. It was only a small hallway with a bunch of dark wood doors on either side, evenly spaced throughout the brick wall. Fortunately, Zoro noticed as he walked down the hallway, the names of the person each office belonged to were on every door. He read some of them, and barely any were familiar. The one he did recognize was Whitebeard, because his best friend Ace fought for the man. Zoro had never personally met him, but he knew Ace completely idolized him, and spent all his free time ranting about how he was going to make Whitebeard and his team surpass even the Warlords, and claim the title as the most elite underground fight team in the world. Finally, Zoro came across the door labeled with Shanks' name, and knocked. He heard a muffled but inviting, "come in!" through the door, and pushed it open.

The inside of the room was simple but classy. A large window filled the back wall, surrounded by gold curtains. and the brick walls had clearly been covered with drywall and painted a deep crimson color. The furniture was all dark wood, like the desk, cabinets, and the long table that stretched against the wall, and a couple random black leather chairs and couches were scattered throughout. To match the curtains, there were decorations and lamps with gold accents in various places as well. It seemed like it should have been a little odd with the color combination and mixture of textures everything had, but both the room and the red haired man in it seemed to hold itself in a way that owned the oddness of the appearance and made it into something strong and unique. Shanks smiled at him warmly, and gestured to one of the two seats on the other side of his desk.

"Zoro," he greeted, "good to see you again, glad you could make it."

Zoro felt relieved at the man's friendly demeanor- he could tell why Luffy liked this guy and still fought for him when there were higher ranking men who offered Luffy a spot on their teams. He felt some tension leave him as he replied sincerely, "I wouldn't have missed it for the world, I've been waiting for this for years now. Thank you."

Shanks' eyes crinkled as he smiled, and he half laughed, "Well, not a problem. It was your skill that got my attention, after all!" Then he laughed added, "Well, that and Luffy telling me you're going to be the world's best someday, and that I would be stupid to pass you up."

Zoro reddened a little at both the compliment, and the fact that it was Luffy after all who got him the opportunity. He rubbed the back of his neck, and didn't quite know what to say, but Shanks read his mind before he even had a chance to reply. "Not that I wasn't already looking your way before Luffy opened his mouth. It kind of just sealed the deal, you know?" Shanks grinned at him, but then turned serious, and the swordsman suddenly felt there was a catch to all this. "Although, I have to say, I really only have a place for one more on my team, Zoro."

Zoro raised an eyebrow, and couldn't help the sarcastic question that came out of his mouth, "What are you implying, do I suddenly have two heads and not count as one man?"

As soon as he said it he cringed; he didn't want to make it sound like he thought he deserved the spot automatically, or that he was already accepted on. He still had to make it through this meeting and maybe something else after that, even, depending on what Shanks decided.

Fortunately, Shanks laughed lightly and said, "Luffy told me you were a funny one!" And then he sat up straighter and clarified, "But no, the problem is that I only have one spot left, but there was someone else from another city's underground organization that I have had my eye on for a while. And turns out he's moving to Chicago for good, and he's willing to join my team now too. And I really don't know which one of you to take…"

Shanks looked like the decision was already a difficult one, and Zoro's heart sank at the news. He felt that it would be foolish to pick him, who had had the offer for about a week now, over this man who Shanks had apparently been wanting from across the country for a long time now. Would he still make it? Suddenly Zoro didn't like this man, and he wanted a chance to prove to Shanks that he could be better. With determination, Zoro decided he wanted to meet this man and take him down- nobody could get in the way of his dream!

Shanks saw the look on Zoro's face and, seeming to _again_ be able to read his mind, informed him, "He should be here any minute now, he's coming to this meeting too, since you two are both trying for the same spot."

Zoro tried to appear friendly, and leaned back in his seat casually. Curious, he asked, "Alright, what's this dude's name?"

At that moment, a voice from the doorway answered, "Sanji. Sanji Black."


	2. Chapter 2

Zoro's jaw clenched and he turned to look at the man who had just announced himself. Looking him over, he was nothing like the swordsman had expected, but he still didn't like the man. Sanji stood leaning against the door frame casually, with blonde shaggy hair that covered one eye, an annoyingly smug expression on his face to match his stupid eyebrows, his teeth closed around an unlit cigarette as he smiled. He was even wearing a midnight blue suit, with a light blue and black pinstripe shirt under the jacket, with the top two buttons undone. Zoro couldn't imagine what this idiot was trying to pull here- didn't he know that only the highest ranking people wore suits? But Sanji didn't seem to care, and he raised a hand in greeting as he strode into the room and took the seat next to Zoro happily.

Shanks raised his hand as well and announced, "Sanji, it's good to see you again, thanks for coming!"

Sanji crossed his right leg over his left and threw his arm up around the back of the seat, sitting as if it were a casual conversation with an old friend. Zoro wasn't sure if this guy was actually making an effort to come across as smooth and unintimidated, or if the blonde actually thought he would have zero trouble in getting to be part of the team. Grinning and holding out his hand, he shook their potential managers hand, and nodded, then turned to Zoro and grinned.

"You must be Zoro," he said pleasantly, and the swordsman found something in the other man's voice that actually made him think this guy might want to be friends, and maybe he wasn't all that bad.

Zoro tried to put on a nice smile in return. "Yep," he confirmed, "Good to meet ya."

Sanji turned his attention back to Shanks, and Zoro was left amazed that he had gone from thinking Sanji was boastful and overconfident to actually thinking that Sanji might actually be a really cool and friendly guy. But that didn't mean there wasn't competition. The red haired man looked amused, but after having both men's attention again, he turned serious.

"So," he began, clearing his throat and shifting in his seat, "as I have mentioned, I only have one spot on the team that is open, but I have the two of you who I think would be equally great additions…."

They both nodded when he paused, and waited expectantly for him to continue. What they heard was absolutely of no surprise. In fact, it was what they had both been guessing would be the case.

"Which is why I decided that I will just let you two go through a series of competitions for it." He smiled at the end, as if it were something he had been looking forward to for ages, and he was proud of coming up with something to make them happy at the same time.

Zoro, of course, told himself that he definitely was happy with the chance, because he was one step closer to his dream. And for that reason, he was going to treat this as a dream within a dream, and focus everything on chasing this one opportunity. After a second, it crossed Zoro's mind that he had absolutely no idea why Sanji would want this as badly as him. Maybe he didn't. Maybe Sanji, who could potentially delay his accomplishing his lifelong goal, was only doing it because he was offered a spot. It suddenly irritated him to no end that this man was so casually strolling into the place that he had worked so hard for.

But there was no way that could be considered to be jealousy. Not a chance. Besides, Sanji was friendly, and there wasn't anything that indicated that the blonde haired man didn't have a dream behind all this as well.

So, letting it go for the time being, Zoro spoke first. "I accept," he agreed without hesitation, or without hearing the conditions.

Shanks looked a mix of amused, proud, and completely unsurprised. He raised an eyebrow and asked, "You don't even want to hear the conditions first?"

Sanji looked to Zoro to see if there was any trace of embarrassment at his not thinking it through, but Zoro already knew he didn't need to know anything more than the fact that he had a shot if he followed Shanks' orders from now on. He simply shook his head and defended himself, "I want to hear them, of course, but they won't change the fact that I accept."

Sanji looked very fractionally surprised, but at the same time neither of them expected Shanks to give them anything outrageous. It was more of just the display of pure motivation that Zoro was exhibiting which was impressive to him.

Nodding sagely, Shanks placed his elbows on the desk in front of him, and rested his chin on his hands. Switching his gaze to Sanji, he waited for the second man to either ask for details, reject it all, or accept as Zoro did. "And you?"

"I expect you're just going to put us through some type of tryout against each other, right?" Sanji asked, rolling his cigarette around a bit with his teeth.

Shanks nodded, "Are you going to accept?"

Sanji smirked confidently, "Obviously." He said it good naturedly, not meaning any attitude. It came across as rather mood-lightening, and the three of them chuckled a bit over it.

Shanks stood up and looked at them both excitedly. "You start tomorrow!" And with that, he walked out of the room in a random hurry, only looking back just past the door frame to add, "Be here at 10 am!"

And Sanji and Zoro simply sat in their respective seats, half surprised at the eccentric man's sudden departure. They both turned to look at each other at the same time, and Zoro rubbed the back of his neck (only very, very, slightly awkwardly), and asked, "So… I can't tell, are we gonna be friends, or are we just going to kill each other and move on when one of us loses?" As far as Zoro's social attempts went, it wasn't a bad one. It was to the point, and Sanji didn't seem to get offended or thrown off by the bluntness.

Instead, the blonde man stood, and looked down at Zoro with a self-assured smile and answered. "I wouldn't mind being friends with you, as long as you aren't the sensitive type who will take it personally when I absolutely kick your ass." The statement was clearly loaded with a playful threat, and Zoro had two reactions at the exact same time. The first part of him thought that he could definitely work with that attitude, and that it would definitely make things fun when they finally came to have to fight. The other part of him was already wanting to start a fight just in reaction to the absolute audacity of the blonde man in his casual statement of how he was going to 'kick Zoro's ass'.

Also coming to stand, he leaned in just a tiny bit, and made his tone into a low and threatening one. He knew Sanji wouldn't actually be threatened by it, but it added effect so he figured he might as well. "I'd like to see you try, dartboard-brow."

Sanji's jaw almost dropped at that, and he sneered defensively, "At least I don't look like I've got moss growing out of my head, marimo." And he turned to storm off towards the door.

Zoro was slightly surprised at the use of the different language that he recognized, but couldn't pin down what the word meant. He rolled his eyes, and turned to watch Sanji go. But just before he left, Sanji turned around one last time and added, "Oh, and Zoro?"

Zoro raised an eyebrow and grunted questioningly, waiting.

Sanji grinned evilly, and haughtily finished, "I hope you don't have any high hopes or dreams riding on this position on Shank's team. Because if you do, they're about to be crushed."

A/N:

So, I know this hasn't picked up really… But I'm really hoping to just get some ideas if I give myself something to build on. I thought about scrapping the whole story, but if nothing else then it will give me a base for other things. Plus I have to keep the account active! Thank you to all of my about two readers xD

Feel free to leave some comments about ideas! Because I NEED IDEAS. Even if it doesn't have to do with this story line. Even if it's about something that happens to the crew in outer space, I don't care, I just would absolutely love some inspiration.

Have a great day, love ya!


	3. Chapter 3

_Great_ , Zoro thought as he drove his bike past numerous familiar streets. _The first day and I'm already going to be late_.

He sighed, and tried again to read the useless street signs. Of all days for the stupid buildings to be moving around on him, it had to be one of the most important days of his life. As he drove past one of the streets, he noticed the flashing sign for one of the bars that wasn't far down the road from the arena he was aiming to find. The swordsman turned sharply, the back tire on his motorcycle giving off an echoing screech from the sudden skid.

The drab brick building was a relief to see- he was finally here, and only five minutes late. Quickly securing his helmet to his now parked bike and grabbing his swords from the case on the back, he scanned his card efficiently and almost ran to the stairs up to Shanks' office. As he was crossing the lounge, he stopped immediately and almost cringed when he heard the red haired man call his name.

"Zoro!" He waved happily and gestured for Zoro to come over. "Glad you made it! Did you get lost again?" The question was friendly enough, and Shanks seemed closer to laughter than anger. Zoro would have laughed as well, if it wasn't for a certain blonde haired man standing in the background with a smug expression on his face.

"I don't get lost," the swordsman mumbled as he frowned at the ground to his right.

Shanks did laugh shortly at that, and he patted Zoro on the back as he walked past him and headed towards the stairs. Scanning his card, he opened the door and motioned for the two men to follow him.

"Well, either way, now that we're all here, we can go straight down to the arena."

Sanji and Zoro followed in silence, and Zoro couldn't stop replaying Sanji's threat in his head. He wasn't intimidated by the man, but he had spent the rest of the night after their meeting yesterday being thoroughly pissed off by the nerve of what Sanji had said. He has a _dream_ , dammit, and this curly-browed moron thinks he can threaten it like it's meaningless. But the swordsman knew he had to focus, and he tried to shake the thought out of his head. He took a deep breath, stretched a little, and brought himself back to the present.

After going down two flights of stairs, the silence was broken by the sound of the heavy door to the arena being opened. The low metallic creaking of the hinges was always a prelude to the bright lights glaring down from the ceiling in the purely grey room. It was an interesting setup, only changed after a fight last year that got way too intense. The arena used to be just a pit slightly lower than the viewing area, barely even roped off. But the battle between Whitebeard himself and one of the leading members on the team known as the Marines, Akainu, turned out to be a heated one. The crowd was actually hit by some of the aftermath of a couple attacks, and from then on it was considered too dangerous to have the fights that close to innocent viewers. So now, the arena was an enormous room with grey cement walls and floor, and at the top of the walls, there were huge glass windows. The windows were supposedly bulletproof, and they were so high up that it would take effort to actually hit them from the pit that was the arena. Behind the insanely tall windows lay tiers of seating for everyone who wanted to watch. The whole setup, although it made Zoro and the other fighters feel like they were in some sort of zoo, was undeniably safer for everybody. Plus, for the competitors, it was nice to be able to fight without worrying about a stray attack going in a bad direction.

As they stepped out into the light of the arena, Zoro could feel his heart begin to beat faster in wonderful anticipation of what was to come. He loved the sound of his footsteps echoing in the soundproof room as his boots struck the cold concrete, and the air that hung in the room without any form of breeze from the outside, charged with energy. After participating in so many good fights in this exact location, it was hard to be in the arena and not feel the same excitement. To top all that off, he had been waiting for almost 24 hours now to be able to have an excuse to put the blonde in his place, and now it was so close. Slightly behind him, he could feel Sanji also beginning to become enthusiastic about their impending fight. Zoro didn't think he had really done much to rub the blonde man the wrong way, besides insulting his eyebrows. But whether he had or hadn't done anything wrong was irrelevant now, as he could tell they were both on not so good terms with each other.

Shanks was smiling like a kid at Christmas again as he cleared his throat to get their attention.

"Now," he started, "I can tell you two are quite ready to fight. Am I right?" He asked, watching their expressions carefully. Zoro and Sanji exchanged glances and then looked back to their potential manager.

"I wouldn't argue with that," Sanji agreed as Zoro nodded his head.

"Well then, in that case," Shanks walked to the edge of the room and stayed safely by the door, gesturing to the center of the room. "Go right on ahead."

As soon as the sentence was finished, or maybe even a moment before, Sanji jumped into action. If not for Zoro's amazing reaction speed, and his ability to smoothly draw his sword at the drop of a hat, he was sure he would have been sent flying across the arena by the kick he barely blocked. There was a metallic ring that echoed across the room as the heel of Sanji's dress shoe connected with the flat front of Zoro's sword. Zoro pressed forward, throwing Sanji's leg back, but the blonde man simply flipped backward and away without losing any control of his motion. Using the small amount of time Sanji's recovery took, the swordsman unsheathed another katana, leaving him now with one in each hand. When Sanji was upright again, he looked over at Zoro slightly disbelievingly.

"You're gonna use two at once," he asked, eyeing both of the swords. "What, are you ambidextrous?"

Zoro rolled his eyes and decided not to answer that question. He wasn't technically ambidextrous, but just as a boxer might throw punches with both hands, he could swing a sword with two as well. Besides, letting his opponent know which side was his strongest was a foolish move. Instead of a direct answer, he decided to answer with a demonstration. He slightly widened his stance, and positioned his swords horizontally above his shoulder.

"72 Pound Cannon," Zoro recited with an eerie around of threat and calm in his voice. Then, he brought his swords around in a rapid circular motion, launching two spirals of compressed air towards his opponent.

There was barely a fraction of a second for Sanji's exclamation of "what!" to be heard before the blonde had to perform an impressively fast set of twists and turns to dodge. It was promising for Shanks as he watched; both the sword attack that should be physically impossible, and the similarly impossible bending Sanji was doing to avoid being hit. Unfortunately, some of the attack did clip Sanji's shoulder, sending him spinning backwards into the wall. The crash wasn't as bad as it would have been if the man had been hit full on, but it was still enough to put a crack in the wall. Zoro grinned, not seeing how Sanji could pose a threat to him if this was all the man could do.

With a slight groan, the blonde stood back up in the small cloud of dust that had formed around the impact. Zoro was watching carefully, and was immediately confused when Sanji crouched down slightly. Sure, he could tell there was a cut to Sanji's shoulder from the attack, but it was only enough to bleed, and definitely not enough to take him out of the fight this early on. _But_ , Zoro thought, _perhaps he hit the wall much harder than it seemed, and he bruised a rib or something._

But almost too quickly for Zoro to notice, Sanji pushed up out of his crouching position against the wall, and launched himself into the air. The motion of the blonde man was almost impossible to follow; quicker than Zoro could react, he realized Sanji was in the air right above his head. It was incredible- with one jump this man had cleared the space of half the arena in the blink of an eye.

"Épaule shoot!" He yelled, extending his leg and swinging it down heavily at Zoro with a graceful but powerful flip. Zoro didn't have time to step completely out of the way, but he managed to nearly fully avoid the attack to his left shoulder. Instead, it caught some of his forearm, and broke the grip he had on his katana. The sword flew from his hand to the ground, where it skidded to the side. There was no time for him to retrieve it, as the blonde kept kicking at him without relent. The attacks didn't ease up, but Zoro could at least keep up the blocks.

Hours later, the two men were stood a few feet from each other, both panting heavily and waiting for the other to move. Zoro was sure his arms and chest were almost entirely bruised deeply from all the hits they had taken. Sanji's right calf had taken an averagely deep cut, the pain of which was evident in the way he was holding his weight off balance, largely favoring the uninjured leg. His shoulder still bared the cut from earlier, and he was sore from having hit the wall and ground numerous times.

After about a minute of the two only glaring each other down, Shanks stepped back towards them. When he was finally standing in between Zoro and Sanji, they stood a bit straighter and regarded him with interest. He looked them both up and down, then announced, "I didn't expect today to be the only day of fighting, so it's fine to leave this one at a tie. You should take a day off tomorrow, but be here Thursday just after 1 in the afternoon, if that time works for you."

The two nodded in response, but neither looked particularly happy to not have won over the other. Content with having the next meeting arranged, Shanks turned and left without another glance or word.

Zoro, having not had a chance to pick up his sword during the fight and instead drawing his third to replace it, slowly turned to retrieve his last katana from the ground. He heard Sanji heading to the door, but when he turned around he realized the blonde man hadn't left and was instead leaning against the open door waiting for him. Slightly annoyed that this meant having to have conversation, the swordsman sighed.

Sanji leveled him with an unimpressed look, "Don't sigh at me like talking to me is some sort of chore, idiot! It's rude!"

Zoro almost smirked at the reaction as he walked over to stand by Sanji, and retorted, "Maybe it is. Chatting with a road block like you isn't really something I put on the list of things I enjoy in my day."

Sanji looked as though he couldn't decide whether to laugh or to be offended, "Oi, don't call me that! Maybe _you're_ in _my_ way!" He thought for a second before adding, "What's this big dream of yours anyway?"

Zoro really did grin at that one. "Well," he replied seriously, "I'm going to be the world's greatest swordsman."

He honestly expected Sanji to laugh at him for being too ambitious. Instead, he received a nod of understanding and slight respect. "Alright then," was the only reply from the blonde's mouth.

The swordsman raised an eyebrow, "No smart comment? No insult? I expected more from you." He was only half joking.

Sanji elbowed Zoro in the side while he hid a smile, and added, "Yeah, see if I were a swordsman I'd say 'to hell with your ambitions', and then I'd kick your ass." The blonde man laughed, "But since I'm not, I'd say it's a decent goal. Now I know I can beat you whenever without damaging your title. So you're safe."

Zoro stood in stunned silence for a while, and he wasn't sure if he still disliked Sanji or not. Sure, there was a lot of attitude and harmless threat in the statement, but at the same time he was one of the few who told Zoro he had a shot at his goal. Was there really respect hiding behind Sanji's facade of self-confidence and degrading insults?

Then, of course, the blonde idiot just had to start talking again and undo all the progress. He looked at Zoro as if the swordsman was the only thing wrong in the world, and added, "But of course you'll have to find a different way to reach your goal. Because the spot on this team is mine."

Zoro scowled at Sanji, and was about to shout something or other back at him, but the blonde left abruptly, letting the door slam shut behind him. The swordsman was left frowning angrily at the back of the door, feeling the cool anger heat up inside him again.

Yep. He still didn't like him.

 **A/N:**

So the first fight! I promise the plot will move along more from now on, since they have officially met and spoken a little more.

Even though this story is slightly less popular than my newer one, please still send me your comments! I'm still really open to ideas, since this could really go anywhere at all…. ;)

Hope your day is lovely :D

~Z


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